De Staic Research offers independent evaluation and research support for neighbourhood health initiatives, community services and preventative healthcare programmes. We help commissioners, providers and partner organisations understand reach, delivery, experience and outcomes, and use the findings to inform service development.
What works, for whom and in what circumstances?
Our realist evaluation approach explores how a service interacts with people’s needs, responses and local circumstances. We examine why an approach may work well for some groups or places and less well for others, and what conditions are needed for improvement or wider delivery.
Access, inclusion and health inequalities
Evaluation can explore who uses a service, who may be missing and what helps or hinders access. Relevant questions include whether location, timing, language, referral arrangements or trust affect participation, and whether the service is meeting the needs of different communities.
We can combine participant surveys with interviews and focus groups, alongside available activity and demographic data. We consider whose voices are represented and where further engagement may be needed.
Understand delivery and partnership working
Research can examine how staff and partner organisations experience delivery, how referral pathways operate and where coordination can be improved. Interviews with delivery teams and stakeholders can help explain the practical conditions that influence implementation.
Assess outcomes in context
We help identify meaningful outcomes and feasible ways to measure them. Depending on the programme, these may include experience, knowledge, confidence, access to support or reported changes in behaviour. We distinguish service activity from outcomes and assess what the study design allows us to conclude.
Where before-and-after surveys or follow-up data are used, we consider response rates, differences between respondents and other influences on change. Findings are reported with appropriate limitations.
Support from planning to reporting
Services include evaluation frameworks and theories of change, questionnaire development, interviews and focus groups, quantitative and qualitative analysis, and accessible reports and presentations. We can design an evaluation before delivery starts or discuss what can be learned from an existing programme.
Related services include EDI research, care sector research and survey and data analysis support.
Discuss a neighbourhood health evaluation. Tell us about your service, the population it aims to reach, its stage of delivery and the decisions you need the evaluation to inform.
